PALEONTOLOGY

The year 1999 in paleontology included important discoveries about the earliest origins of several major groups of organisms, including vertebrates, invertebrates, plants, and fungi. Furthermore, the fossil record in general was deemed sufficiently complete to address questions of the origin and evolution of life, according to a new volume edited by Stephen K. Donovan and Christopher R.C. Paul, The Adequacy of the Fossil Record. The editors concluded that the fossil record was surprisingly complete, preserving perhaps 10% of all species that existed in the past. Previously, it had been estimated that only about 1% of species had been preserved.

Vertebrate paleontologists reported a Devonian Period (408 million–360 million years ago) fish with bones in the front limbs that strongly resembled the fingers of a land animal. Because other features of the specimen suggested that it was not directly ancestral to primitive amphibians, the digits apparently did not evolve for walking on land. This unusual fossil also indicated that appendages with “fingers” evolved in more than one lineage of primitive fish.

Africa continued to yield interesting dinosaur material. Suchomimus, a new theropod from Niger, possessed an extremely elongated snout in addition to a low sail-like structure on its back. Apparently the snout had been adapted for catching fish. In light of some recent discoveries from Africa and elsewhere, a new review of dinosaur evolutionary patterns suggested that there was little coevolution between dinosaur predators and prey or between herbivores and plants during the time of the dinosaurs (Mesozoic Era). Contrary to previous ideas, this study also suggested that the Mesozoic breakup of Pangaea (the ancient landmass that included all of the present continents) had little effect on dinosaur distribution patterns.

Another significant dinosaur discovery was reported from Antarctica late in 1998. A single tooth collected from deposits approximately 65 million–70 million years old (Late Cretaceous Period) on Vega Island near the Antarctic Peninsula represented the first hadrosaurid (duck-billed) remains from Antarctica. This find indicated that hadrosaurs were more common in the Southern Hemisphere than had been previously thought. Evidence of the only other hadrosaur from a southern continent came from Patagonia in southern Argentina. Antarctica’s oldest-known fossil bird was found in the same deposit that yielded the hadrosaur.

For years paleontologists envisioned the large herbivorous dinosaurs with long necks and tails—sauropods such as Apatosaurus, Diplodocus, and Brachiosaurus—as browsers that ate foliage high in the trees. Some investigators even suggested they could rear up on their powerful hind limbs to reach the youngest leaves at the tops of the trees. A biomechanical study using articulated digital reconstructions of two sauropods concluded, however, that sauropod necks were much less flexible than previously thought. In fact, the authors of the study believed that sauropods were better adapted for ground feeding than high browsing.

Another study involving sauropods indicated that members of this group, which included the largest land animals that ever lived, grew to adulthood surprisingly quickly. The research used growth rings in the shoulder blades of sauropods of various ages to measure rates of growth. Bones of half-sized individuals were estimated to be just 4 or 5 years old, and it was believed that these sauropods reached full size at 8 to 11 years old.

In 1999 the same Chinese locality where spectacular specimens of feathered dinosaurs had been found the previous year yielded one of the most complete skeletons of an animal very close to the base of the mammalian family tree. Analysis of this skeleton suggested that a family (Triconodontidae) long considered to include the direct ancestors of modern mammals was not a natural group. Originally founded on characteristics of the teeth, it appeared that some triconodonts are close relatives of the mammals whereas others are not.

Recent DNA analysis supported a radical new view that was emerging from the fossil record concerning the origin of turtles. The studies suggested that the traditional portrayal of turtles as primitive reptiles closely related to the basal reptiles of the late Paleozoic was false. Instead, turtles were now considered to be of a type similar to the more advanced archosaurs (crocodiles, birds, dinosaurs) or lepidosaurs (lizards, snakes). Although the morphological data indicated that turtles were related to lepidosaurs, DNA data suggested that they were closer kin to archosaurs. Both data sets, however, indicated that turtles were not the less-developed reptiles they had been perceived to be. The new interpretation moved the turtles to a position near the top of the evolutionary tree of reptiles, rather than very close to its base.

A vertebrate assemblage reported from Axel Heiberg Island in the high Canadian Arctic provided evidence of very warm climates at high latitudes during the Late Cretaceous (92 million–86 million years ago). Among these fossils were several varieties of aquatic and semiaquatic freshwater vertebrates such as fish, turtles, and reptiles, including champsosaurs. Like turtles, the 2.4-m (7.8-ft)-long Champsosaurus (an extinct reptile resembling a large crocodile) was ectothermic (cold-blooded), which suggested that the environmental conditions were very mild at extreme latitudes just before the Cretaceous extinction. This assemblage was probably a better indicator of high-latitude warmth than were the Late Cretaceous dinosaurs discovered in the 1980s on the North Slope of Alaska. Unlike the case of dinosaurs, endothermy (warm-bloodedness) and migration to lower latitudes during the winter did not apply to turtles and champsosaurs.

The field of invertebrate paleontology was not free of controversy. Fossils from India described as burrows of a wormlike animal were claimed to be 1.1 billion years old. This interpretation placed the origin of metazoans (multicelled animals) before 1.1 billion years ago, which implied that animal evolution began earlier and progressed much more slowly than had been believed and called into question the Cambrian “explosion” of animal forms that was thought to have occurred about 580 million years ago. While some believe these fossils may represent animal burrows, evidence in associated deposits placed the fossils’ age at only about 600 million years. This dating placed these fossils very close in age to the Cambrian diversification of shelled metazoans.

One of the most significant papers in the field of paleobotany published in 1999 described angiosperms, the oldest-known flowering plants. The fossils from China were first reported in 1997–98 and were dated to approximately 165 million years ago (Late Jurassic Period). For years paleobotanists had estimated the origin of angiosperms at approximately 130 million years ago. The fossil plants from China were placed in a new genus, Archaefructus, and they suggested that some of the earliest, most primitive angiosperms produced relatively large flowers and fruits. The existence of these specimens also made Asia a potential site for the origin of all flowering plants.

The family tree of a large group of fungi was also followed farther back through time. The oldest-known ascomycetes (a class of “true fungi”), recently discovered in Scotland, pushed back the origin of the fungi to approximately 400 million years ago (Early Devonian Period) and demonstrated the level of biodiversity that existed during the fungi’s early colonization of the land.

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